A great number of posts have criticized me and other folks for forming an opinion about the Duke rape case before a jury has weighed in. Steve of “A Republic, Madam” writes:
Liberals, stick to your guns! The accused deserve the benefit of the doubt up to a certain point, and that point has not been crossed. Do cries of rape trump civil liberties and criminal protections? I sure hope not. … My support of the lacrosse players, at least in lieu of more evidence, is grounded in liberal, not conservative, thought.
I believe very much in “innocent until proven guilty.” If and when the police make arrests in this case, I want the accused rapists (whoever they turn out to be) to have their day in court, to be able to present a defense aided by legal council, and to be presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond any reasonable doubt. Then, and only then, should they be sent to prison for what I hope is a long miserable stay.
But “innocent until proven guilty” is a courtroom standard. My opinion is not the same as a courtroom, and blog posts don’t put anyone in prison. Nothing about the American system of justice requires ordinary citizens to refrain from having opinions; and it’s not inconsistent to want Courts to adhere to “beyond any reasonable doubt” while holding my personal opinions to a less stringent standard.
Furthermore, there’s a difference between being morally guilty and legally guilty. As Jeff puts it in comments:
Admonishing one side to “leave it up to the courts” (and it is only one side; I’ve never heard anybody told they shouldn’t assert an accused rapist’s innocence because the jury hadn’t rendered a verdict) equates a legal standard with a moral one, and sends the message that it’s not really rape if they can get away with it.
At this time, unless new evidence completely changes this case, it seems clear that a brutal pack rape happened. That deserves our moral outrage, even without a court’s verdict.
Jeralyn Merrit – who has discussed this case on mainstream TV news – writes:
Rape is a serious charge. It is easy to make and difficult to defend.
I’d love to bury this centuries-old sausage. (It goes back to the mid-17th century at least, when Matthew Hale called rape “an accusation easy to be made, hard to be proved, but harder to be defended by the party accused, though innocent”). I’d like to remind Jeralyn of the OC pack rape case – in which the victim, Jane Doe, has endured (and continues to endure) years of her character being trashed in public. Her friends were recruited by the defense to tell lies about her, and private detectives chased her from school to school, because she dared to press charges against her pack rapists. It took two trials to obtain a conviction, even though the rapists videotaped the rape.
Was that charge easy for Jane Doe to make? Was the rejection and abuse from the community around her easy? Was the defense’s burden – in which even a videotape of the rape taking place almost wasn’t enough for a conviction – too heavy?
Jane Doe’s experience was extreme, but hardly unique. The defense strategy of attacking rape victims goes back decades (centuries?), and guarantees that rape is not a charge easily made. In particular, when a working-class black stripper accuses wealthy whites of rape, it’s all but guaranteed that if it comes to a trial the defense will put her through hell. To call this accusation “easy to make” shows an appalling blindness to how our court system often puts rape victims on trial.
Jeralyn then sums up the case – but in her effort to spread confusion and create reasonable doubt, she gets her facts wrong. Here, she discusses the 911 call so many people have gone on about:
The women leave the party. One goes back in. She leaves again and meets up with the second woman. At some point, the second woman calls 911 to complain about racial epithets hurled at her by one or more males at the house. (listen to the call here.)Within two minutes police arrive, there is no sign of the woman.
But in fact, according to the News & Observer, “Police said they don’t know who made the 911 call to report the racial slurs.” So why does Jeralyn believe she knows something the police don’t?
(And why does it matter? Jeralyn doesn’t explain how this call – no matter who made it – is evidence that no rape took place.)
Jeralyn also quotes from “Inside Lacrosse,” which according to her has “the best coverage of the story”:
Of note are two phone calls received by the Durham Police that night, the first made by a woman who said she was driving by the house at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd., about an hour before the alleged rape took place, at which point, according to transcripts of the conversation, she was met with racial slurs.
About an hour before the alleged rape took place? That would be a blow to the accusation of rape, if true – because the police showed up a few minutes afterward the first 911 call, and found the house quiet and seemingly empty (although filled with the detritus of party). But according to this time line of events (which Jeralyn herself linked to), the next-door neighbor saw the women enter the house at about midnight and drive away between 12:45 and 1 a.m. – so if the rape occured, it occured in that time range. But the first 911 call was made at 12:53 a.m. So it’s extremely sloppy of the “best coverage of the story” to claim the call was made an hour before the rape.
That wasn’t Jeralyn’s point; I just commented on it because the bad fact-checking was so blatant. Jeralyn’s point, I think, is that the first 911 caller’s story had inconsistent details – was she walking or driving? How many men used racial epithets? But these inconsistencies don’t prove anything. First of all, there’s no evidence that the first 911 call is connected to the rape victim. Second, people who call 911 can’t fairly be expected to present a well-organized story, without any stumbles or misspeaking; on the contrary, from the recordings I’ve heard, 911 callers are often flustered and confused.
So how does a 911 caller, who may or may not have ever seen the (alleged) rape victim in her life, mixing up “walking” and “driving” prove that no rape happened that night? Jeralyn doesn’t say.
Then there’s this:
In an article filed by the Herald-Sun on March 29, Angel Altmon, the security guard who made a 911 call at 1:22 a.m. on March 14 […] claimed the driver of the car said she was not at the party with the alleged victim. […]
But in an article in the Duke Chronicle the following day, Kammie Michael, public information officer for the Durham Police Department, told the Chronicle the woman who drove the alleged victim to the grocery store was in fact the second dancer at the party.
Well, that certainly proves there was no rape!
Uh, wait. How does it prove anything? Explanation of relevance, Jeralyn?
Maybe Altmon misheard. Or maybe not all strippers are eager to tell total strangers what they do for a living. There are a lot of reasons this sort of very minor discrepancy can happen; you need more than “there were minor discrepancies in the 911 calls” to put together a plausible case for false rape accusation.
(You can read the transcripts of the two 911 calls here).
Jerelyn then quotes a forensic pathologist:
Usually, a physician can’t tell consensual from non-consensual. They can tell whether there’s been intercourse or not intercourse, but not whether it’s consensual because one can have bruises and certain injuries from consensual sex and one can have no injuries from non-consensual sex.
What Jerelyn doesn’t mention (and perhaps doesn’t know) is that the girl was beaten up. As the girl’s father told a TV news reporter:
The man described what his daughter looked like when she was released from a hospital. “Her face was all swollen up, her jaw. She couldn’t half walk. One of her legs was hurt.”
To me, that kind of injury doesn’t sound like the result of consensual sex for anyone but an extreme BDSMer. It sounds particularly unlikely for a stripper, who depends on her looks to feed herself and her children. (Maybe the father was lying – but it would be a very stupid lie, since the police would have taken photographs.)
Why do I think this story is true?
1) The victim’s story seems both plausible and similar to other pack-rape cases I’ve read about.
2) Both the medical exam and her father’s comments about her injuries are consistent with her story of being violently attacked and raped.
3) The police, when they searched the house where she claims she was raped, found her makeup bag and five of her torn-off fingernails. Again, consistent with her story.
4) Elements of her story are supported by the testimony of the next-door neighbor, Jason Bissey (see the timeline).
Do I think that’s absolute proof? No. It’s possible that further evidence could come along which would change the way things look entirely. (Always a possibility, with any crime.)
But at this moment, the evidence that a rape took place is pretty straightforward and convincing, whereas the evidence that a false accusation took place is… I’m not even sure what it is. “A couple of 911 calls were not perfectly consistent, therefore a false accusation has taken place!” seems to be the gist of it. That’s not convincing. That’s not anything.
* * *
P.S. Jeralyn links to this awful Findlaw article, which proposes that anyone who makes a rape accusation should be put on trial without an attorney or the chance to present a defense. Here’s my comments on that proposal from the last time Jeralyn linked it, in 2003.
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Well, the fact that the assault happened means that somebody must have done it. ‘Innocent until proven guilty’, as i always understood it, refers to particular alleged perps who have been arrested, charged and put on trial – sod-all to do with whether a crime was committed. A corpse with a knife sticking out blatantly suggests that the murder happened, regardless of the guilt or otherwise of the person who gets charged with the said murder.
One of the things that I find ironic is that these people who are so quick to point out alternative theories and suggest that this never happen are prognosticating (sp) about evidence that is either wrong or simply not there. All the while they are telling those of us who are inclined to support the victim that we shouldn’t jump the gun that we shouldn’t prognosticate that we don’t have all of the facts. Hello, nobody has all of the facts yet.
This is the court of public opinion, not a court of law–if we couldn’t comment on legal cases until they were over we may as well get rid of court TV and all of those even legal shows. Moreover, some of the things they are bringing up I haven’t seen anywhere–such as the argument that she was high. The security guard at Krogers is the one who suggested that, but this woman had not idea exactly what was going on. Plus, that has nothing to do with whether or not this woman was raped.
You know, people accused of a crime have their day in court. Women like Jane Doe from the OC rape case, assaulted sex workers, and the girl who was pack-raped in Chicago (and saw her attackers acquited) don’t have the same opportunity to confront their “accusers”–mainly spineless rumor-mongers and locker-room gossips. They also don’t have much protection from the harassment and intimidation they have to put up with after the DA files charges.
And if we’re going to be required to censor ourselves when it comes to rape, then we are going to have to do it for any crime, commited by anyone, and we should also do it WRT to the accusations flung about by the defense in rape cases (see: OC pack rape case). Certainly, I don’t see anyone on Jeralyn’s blog refraining from comment on any harebrained theory about how rape survivors are golddigging sluts.
I’m very uncomfortable with what I regard as a rush to judgement in this case. The evidence you and others cite is very troubling indeed and should be diligently investigated. But the DA, Mike Nifong, seems to be going out of his way to demonize the entire Duke LAX team.
For example, he very public asks why the players need an attorney if they haven’t done anything wrong (and therefore, in my opinion, implicates all of them). Well a very good reason for every innocent person to obtain an attorney in any instance such as this is the problem of the prisoner’s dilemma. All good liberals will remember the Central Park rape case, and in fact you cite it in your “wilding” post. Well those supposed to have gone “wilding” didn’t commit the crime, although they were incentivized to make up lies implicating one another. Counterpunch has a good recap here: http://www.counterpunch.org/cassel1221.html
And what about the DNA evidence? What if there is no match with any of the Duke LAX players? I believe the picture, at this point, is far too murky to make definitive claims about Duke LAX players having committed rape.
Was it 5 fingernails? When this case first came out, I heard 3, then 4, now 5. Do they keep finding more, or were their inaccurate claims somewhere?
I don’t doubt that the girl was raped. I don’t know who did it, but callling her a gold-digging slut isn’t exactly helpful.
I think the victim deserves someone to take her side for once. These guys can get a fancy lawyer, and are protected by their status. Nobody is calling them into account for their rowdyness or loud partying, and saying that is why they raped the woman, but the woman is being bashed by rape apologists right and left.
“But the DA, Mike Nifong, seems to be going out of his way to demonize the entire Duke LAX team. ”
And?
The entire Duke lacrosse team has shat on the community for years — turn around is fair play.
But the DA, Mike Nifong, seems to be going out of his way to demonize the entire Duke LAX team.
You mean the attendees of a party where a woman was gang raped? It’s not because they’re the lacrosse team. It’s because of the crime.
An example of how difficult it is for a woman to prove a rape was well illustrated in an article in the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel 10 years ago. It was about a woman whose attacker crawled in her open window and assaulted her. He then claimed during the trial that they met at the pool and she invited him back later. Prosecutors desperately wanted to use the fact that she was a lesbian during the trial but she refused to let them, given that a straight woman wouldn’t have that evidence. The guy was found not guilty.
No, it’s not. Two wrongs do not make a right. Although I thank you for stating so clearly what seems to be motivating many of those who are ready to hang the dookies.
Your claim, if I understand it correctly, is that prosecutorial misconduct is acceptable when rape is alleged?
is that prosecutorial misconduct is acceptable when rape is alleged?
I’m going to bet dollars to donuts that you have no idea what constitutes prosecutorial misconduct. It’s a legal standard, not a rhetorical flourish. And no, it’s my contention that when the authorities have probable cause to suspect that a violent crime has been committed, they can pursue the perpetrators and those who may have aided and abetted them.
Try not to derail the thread 10 comments in, hm?
Decon: what part of the crime do you disbelieve? Barring non-consensual sex, what about the beating and strangulation?
These men, specifically the lacrosse team, have proven, year after year after year, their willingness to engage in illegal and disruptive behavior, with little to no regard to the consequences. Suddenly, when the crimes escalate (or are finally reported) these men are innocent until proven guilty?
Honey, they’ve been proving their guilt for years. Hell, they’ve already copped to criminal activity the night of the party, so I’m really not sure what “innocence” of theirs you’re trying to shore up.
It’s not prosecutorial misconduct to put pressure on witnesses to pony up evidence. Depending on the circumstances, different kinds of pressure are more or less likely to work. In this case, making uncooperative witnesses bear a bit of shame in the court of public opinion seems fairly benign — compared, say, to other kinds of prosecutorial bullying that occurs all the time — like threatening to go after implicated but non-instigating spouses or other family members in order to get a plea deal. Obviously, these witnesses were at least initially more worried about preserving the integrity of their “team spirit” whatever that is. The prosecutor, hopefully, has made it clear that they can’t have it both ways — if the opinion of their teammates is that important then by God they are going to take one for the team and let the chips fall where they may when it comes to what the rest of the world thinks about “gang loyalty”. Boo fucking hoo.
Of course the charges should diligently investigated. See comment #5 for my statement to that effect.
But no doughnuts for you. I’m all too familiar with prosecutorial misconduct. You probably agree that Ken Starr engaged in such. And that Peter Fitzgeral hasn’t. Please don’t disappear down the post modern rabbit hole defending prosecutorial behaviour which if directed against, say, the “wilding” teens of central park, you would condemn. Prosectuors have far too much power, and routinely abuse it without censure in the red state wasteland I’m most familiar with.
decon, I tend to agree that prosecutors have too much power. But I really don’t see what has happened here as analogous to the central park wilding case. When faced with a stone wall from potential witnesses, a prosecutor has to guage whether it is because of the likelihood that the witness was actually a perpetrator, or because of misplaced loyalty is protecting one, or is simply and justifiably fearful of what will happen if he comes forward, or a combination of all three (as in, implicated but not the primary wrongdoer who is afraid of being tried but also afraid of being killed if he turns over evidence). In this case, shame seems to be the most likely tactic for forcing cooperation, because it’s not like the lacrosse players are at risk of being assassinated if they testify.
Coercing cooperation by resort to public shame and such may be ugly but it’s not the same thing as coercing a confession, which is obviously and always wrong. Obviously, the seriousness of the crime is also a relevant consideration. And it doesn’t bother me that these guys retained attorneys. Attorneys usually encourage witnesses to ditch the group loyalty.
P.S. Another difference from the central park wilding case is that there’s no real question but that the victim was at the lacrosse players’ house that night, and there appears to be physical evidence to corroborate that something might have happened there. My understanding is that there was never any objective, third party evidence that the guys who signed the false confessions in the central park case were in contact with the victim. Unfortunately, it’s sometimes hard to find a bright line when it comes to defining prosecutorial misconduct.
It wouldn’t astound me if many of the LAX players were totally innocent – not only of this rape, but of having any knowledge about the rape.
So I can see the point in saying that all 48 members of the LAX team shouldn’t be demonized.
But it seems incredibly unlikely that all of them are innocent (even if none of them committed the rape, some of them may have important knowledge that they’re withholding, such as descriptions of other guests at the party). Under the circumstances, and given the severity of the crime, I don’t think the use of public shaming by the DA is out of line. Barbara’s posts (#15, 17, 18) really address this question well.
I agree with Decon about this. Even if I were totally innocent and intending on cooperating with the prosecution, I’d still hire an attorney, if I had the money.
What drives me crazy is folks who say “don’t make judgments until we have more evidence,” but then imply or speculate or just flat-out say that they expect the victim has made a false accusation.
Please don’t disappear down the post modern rabbit hole defending prosecutorial behaviour which if directed against, say, the “wilding” teens of central park, you would condemn.
Decon,
What is it about this case that is hard to understand? The police found 4 fingernails & her cellphone and her makeup bag in the house. (They held her from behind with an arm around her neck. Her nails broke off as she tried to pull away the arm that was cutting off her airway.)
The medical examination found tearing and injuries consistent with rape. Her father says that her face is bruised.
She showed up at the grocery store a few minutes after she escaped the house. A security guard called 911 and the woman refused to get out of the car. The security guard said the woman looked disoriented. She went to the hospital for a professional exam with a nurse trained to collect evidence while treating rape victims.
A court standard is innocent until proven guilty. But we are all free to take and judge the information available to us.
What is disturbing to me is the silence. Somebody saw something at that party. But the entire team refuses to talk to the police.
His name’s Patrick Fitzgerald, not Peter.
I’m still wholly unconvinced that targeting the attendees of a party where an alleged violent crime occurred approaches the bounds of ethical conduct by any stretch of the imagination, and I think Barbara provides convincing justification for this view.
Also, an overzealous prosector isn’t some sort of proof that the charges have been fabricated.
To pretend that interogating a group of minor teen agers for thirty hours (if I recall correctly) without the presence of their parents or lawyers is the equivalent of a prosecutor impugning the virtue of a group of potential witnesses to a crime who collectively refuse to provide any infromation about what happened is simply absurd, and proof of how rich white kids are going to be held to a very different, and vastly more lax, standard. Ooh, the prosecutor said some things about them that aren’t very nice, surely that is at least as bad as low grade torture. Surely threatening to prosecute people for refusing to provide evidence of a crime to protect their buddies is the same as fabricating confessions.
Reasonable and decent people, present but unaware at the scene of a brutal crime, should cooperate fully with the police, in the hopes that their limited view of the situation would provide some clue of who might have had a better view of the situation. If everyone who was actually innocent at the party cooperated with the police, it would allow the police to reconstruct the party, thereby working out who was not innocent.
It seems to me that there are two possibilities: either everyone at the party was basically aware of what was happening and therefore chooses to remain silent rather than implicate themselves, or everyone at the party believes that someone at the party commited the rape, but that their team should be above or outside the law. I have a very hard time constructing a scenario in which every single player is remaining silent under advice of council that does not involve everyone present being aware of the rape when it happened. Even in that case, reasonable council ought to be seeking deals for the least involved players, unless they are respecting the team loyalty.
It seems reasonably likely to me that most of the players didn’t know exactly what was happening, but that doesn’t matter. They know now what happened, and their silence to the police is an active refusal to provide evidence that would help to resolve a crime. They have chosen to stand with their rapist team mates rather than with the the victim and with the rest of civil society. Even if (and I don’t believe it for a second) no rape occurred and this is all the product of some bizarre conspiracy, everyone who was at that party who refuses to provide evidence to the police has chosen to stand with their rapist team mates. The choice to refuse to help the police figure out what happened has to be based in the assumption that their team mates committed rape and should get away with it. It certainly isn’t based in a rational fear that rich, white Duke students won’t get a fair trial in Durham.
Ampersand:
Speculation, explicitly indicated as such, and reasonably based upon available information doesn’t contradict the maxim not to make judgements. That said, I see no available information in this case to support speculation about a false accusation. On the contrary, the evidence that a rape occured seems pretty compelling.
However the hypocrisy of those you condemn is not a reason to reject the maxim.
I agree with everything else you said (comment 19).
thank you for this post. i too have noticed how quick everyone is to say “don’t rush to judgement” but it seems it’s only reserved for rape. we can “rush to judge” ken lay and tom delay and every other criminal ASAP but when it comes to rape we’re all supposed to immediately dismiss the victim’s claims and wait for the courts to decide.
from what i’ve read and from past experience, i am much more inclined to believe her and i do.
xoxo, jared
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Much as I like Jeralyn Merritt, seeing the defense’s side is an occupational hazard for her. She’s a criminal defense lawyer, and one of the best. I’ve worked in that field, and I tended to see the defense’s side (even when it was a stretch) much more then than I do today, years removed.
We are not a court of law. We cannot impose a sentence, we are not bound by the rules of evidence, and we are not bound by the verdict. We are not required to be unanimous, or even to decide guilt or its absence. We’re just folks. We can all make up our own minds based on the facts that are available to us.
So far, the inconsistencies that Merritt has pointed to don’t give me any pause. I think she went back into that party and got gang-raped, strangled, beaten and robbed just like she said. So far we know that she was sexually penetrated, that she had lost some fingernails, and that an (interested) witness says her face and bodily movements were consistent with a beating. The fingernails were found in the Lacrosse house, with her cell phone, which tells us that she was there, some sort of physical trauma or struggle happened, and she left either in a hurry or disoriented or both. After the two women left the first time, it is unlikely that she would have returned and had consensual sex with anyone there: she was neither on good terms with them nor sure of her safety. So far, it is the hypothesis of innocence, rather than the case for guilt, that looks strained. Whether the evidence makes out the elements of the offense will be determined at the time of trial, assuming someone is charged. Meanwhile, I’m going to apply my own thinking to the news as I learn it.
I’m one of those who is holding to the “don’t rush to judgement” maxim in this case because those who we are judging are a group of 48 men, rather than the 3 (?) rapists. There seems to be sufficient evidence to indicate that a rape did take place but no evidence as to who the perp was, other than there is a good chance that the perp belongs to a specific community, but maybe not even that.
How is the above scenario any different than judging all black students at a university for a crime committed by one unidentified black man? Is it the size of the community that is relevant? Is it the proximity of the community to the scene of the crime?
I think that if this rape occurred at a party where there happened to be 48 black men and the victim said the rapist was black, that the good liberals in our midst wouldn’t be determining collective guilt for all of the black men at that party.
This rush to embrace collective guilt is what makes me uncomfortable and why I favor viewing the individual team members as innocent until evidence develops that indicates which, if any, team member is the likely rapist.
Tangoman, at least a large part of why many of us would react badly to holding a group defined by race (especially black folks in the South) accountable for the acts of one member of that group is the continuing problem of discrimination. Another is the ugly history of scapegoating by lynching the first available member of that community.
By contrast, saying nasty things about the Duke Lacrosse team just isn’t the same. Or are you arguing that lacrosse players are the victims of one of history’s great crimes and still suffer from bigotry and unwarranted prosecutions?
I posted the below on Rachel’s Tavern, but I think it is relevant to this discussion. The way I see it, you basically have 2 kinds of people – those who are able to believe that such heinous acts can be committed by “basically good kids” and those who are not willing to believe it, which leads them to concoct elaborate schemes for explaining the rape and beating of this woman (which as far as I can tell is not in question – the only thing that IS in question is the who) so as to hold dear to the idea that “such good boys” could not have done this. This is probably a bit of an oversimplification, but I think the post below outlines pretty well why I personally do not find at all difficult to believe that “good boys” are indeed criminals.
Recently, many people have come out trying to find an alternative explanation other than gang rape for what happened to the young woman in Durham. I’m not surprised by these accusations of the victims or the unwillingness of people to believe that fine, upstanding, Disciplined athletes like those of the Duke Lacrosse team could ever commit such an atrocity. I’m not surprised but I’d like to comment on it.
You see, we in the internet community do NOT have all the facts. It is possible she is lying and they are innocent – not plausible if you ask me, but possible nonetheless and I think that as long as people have the option to grasp at straws they will. Many of the people who are willing to believe whatever crazy scenerio – that she hired someone to assault her so she could plant evidence and pretend they did it – are most likely people who can most easily identify with the alleged assailants. And it’s simply easier to believe that upper class white men who have been “golden boys” for most of their lives (with the exception of some drunken rowdiness – which is after all, just boys being boys) are being accussed and treated unfairly then it is to believe that these young men – supposedly “future leaders of our country” committed such heinous acts. You see, these people think that gang rape and outright racist slurs are the actions of sociopaths or uneducated, low class criminals. They simply can not reconcile the idea that such “good kids” from “good families” could possibly be a part of this.
On the other hand, you have those who – although they may not identify directly with the alleged victim, are more inclined to believe her. I fall into this camp. I fall into this camp because it is not at all difficult for me to believe that over privileged white men acted together in a way that attempted to display their power and superiority. I’m willing to bet that the men involved in the rape itself are NOT sociopaths. That they are not sick or twisted in overt ways and that they may even have earned respect from teachers, friends, parents,etc. So, if I believe that these young men are not psycologically messed up – how could I possibly believe that they committed these crimes? Simple – I bet they didn’t think they were doing anything wrong. Wait, you say, how can that be? All of their lives, they have probably (and yes, I am speculating here) been told that they can have anything they want and that most people are fortunate just to have the privilege of sharing their air. When you mix that attitude – that life is just a bowl of cherries ripe for the picking, with group hypermasculinity and intoxication you have a recipe for disaster – if you are in their way. I’m willing to bet they are shocked to death by all the attention this is getting. For them, they hired her for the night – she was their property to do with what they chose (puns intended). I’m sure they are VERY surprised that anyone cares what happened to an African American sex worker (particularly if she was on drugs or has a history of drug use – I have no idea if that is true or not – but it would certainly add to their perceived worth of her – or lack thereof).
Horseshit you say. How could anyone possibly think that oral, vaginal and anal sexual assault is ever ok? Well, let me give you an analogy that hits close to home for me.
My father is an upstanding, well respected middle aged man. He is a professional who is one of the BEST in his field, he’s talented at his hobbies, funny, likes to relax and hang out with his friends and always provided for his family. He is also a rapist. He is not a convicted rapist. He was never tried. He doesn’t have the identity of a rapist, and yet, he is. My mother was a diabetic and she would sometimes have hypoglycemic reactions – which means that her blood sugar would be so low that it could put her in a coma if not treated properly and soon enough. It often happened at night – she would be sleeping, go into shock and not wake up and be able to eat something or get sugar into her system. Often, she’d be in shock enough to make her unconscious – certainly incapable of controlling anything around her. On MORE THAN ONE OCCASSION, MORE THAN ONE of my sisters walked in on my father raping my mother while she was in shock. This went on for anywhere from 3-5 YEARS (possibly longer, but there are only witnesses for that long). Sick, you say. Twisted, you say. Yup, and yet, he is well respected and well liked by most of those around him. I don’t pretend to understand my parents relationship. I have no idea why my mother stayed – she knew it was happening – my sisters tried to talk to her about it. My sisters would yell at my dad to stop, threaten to call the police – but the police were never called, charges were never filed. The only people who know that this occurred are those in my family. Everyone except myself has “come to terms” with it. My mother passed away, and my sisters say things like, “it was a long time ago.” “He’s changed.” Blah Blah Blah. My point is that just because we don’t SEE people like ourselves as criminals doesn’t mean they aren’t.
This is hard to swallow – believe me, I know. But my point is that my dad didn’t think he was doing anything wrong. Don’t ask me what he WAS thinking – I don’t have the emotional fortitude to confront him – maybe that makes me weak, but it is what it is. He was married to my mother and to some extent that makes her body available to him – always. he may have been trying to teach her a lesson – in order to stop her from having the hypoglyceminc shocks – doubtful but possible… But my larger point is that he has SOME rationale for explaining his behavior. There is nothing rational about it, there’s nothing that excuses it to you or I, but for HIM, for HIS CONSCIENCE, he has explained it away. He is not a criminal (at least not in his mind).
Similarly, I think the men on the Duke Lacrosse team who allegedly raped the young woman have some sort of explanation in their heads that absolve them of responsibility. They may believe these rationales so completely that they are probably puzzled by the outrage and outcry. They may have lied to themselves so completley that they have begun to really believe it. The truth is, I have very little faith that any of the Lacrosse players will see the inside of a prison – they have too much wealth and power at their disposal. However, it’s not at all difficult for me to believe that they committed crimes that night – probably not everyone on the team, but there were those direcly involved, those that were complicit in it and those that found out after the fact and have reamined silent. They have come up with some way in their minds to explain what they did and why it wasn’t wrong.
Another poster tried to come up with an example of gang rape by an athletic team. He found none. That doesn’t surprise me. That also doesn’t mean it has never happened. To me, it simply means that it was never reported or never proven, but I have NO doubt that it has occurred in the past and will occur in the future. The young woman who is an alleged victim in this case has one of the most difficult tasks ahead of her. She has to agree to push forward, to face her attackers in court, to try to make certain some justice is served. And if she does, it will be record breaking – and maybe, just maybe, the next young woman who is assaulted by a group of college boys will have just the slightest easier time. And maybe, just maybe we can convince young, privileged men that women are not available to them just because they want them.
TangoMan, the reason why the lacrosse players are under suspicion is because they were, apparently, in the same location as the victim when she was attacked, not because they are lacrosse players and not because they are white.
When a victim is raped in isolation it is frustrating not to bring the perpetrator to justice because there are no witnesses and she cannot identify the attacker. But to know that someone was raped and not to bring the perpetrator to justice because there were too many people milling around and they are unwilling to assist you in figuring out who did the deed deeply undermines notions of civility and rule of law. It is almost by definition a pure form of lawlessness because it is clear beyond reckoning that no one who was present has any interest in seeing that the law is carried out. We are privilged to live in a place and time that values law. As stupid and bourgeois as that sounds my prescription for anyone who takes it lightly is to go live in Haiti or a former Soviet Republic for six months or a year and see what it’s like to live law-free for a while.
I don’t believe that anyone that can beat, rape, and strangle a woman is “basically a good kid”. He may very well be viewed that way in the community, but other’s opinions of him don’t make it so.
There is a problem with rape on campuses across the country, but I don’t think that those that engage in gang rape are “good kids” no matter how they justify their behavior to themselves. They may not be sociopaths, but there is a definitive lack of empathy. It takes someone with little or no empathy to have sex with a passed out woman, to spike a woman’s drink with the date rape drug of choice and have sex with her, or to beat her into submission. These are not the acts of “good kids”, but rather the acts of criminals. It matters little to me that they are white, middle-class, athletes. I still call those that perpetrated this crime criminals.
#17, agreed there is a difference between a coerced confession and publicly defaming a large group many of whom are innocent. Both are wrong and shouldn’t be sanctioned, but the former usually has more serious consequences than the latter.
#19, I concur. Something went badly wrong and it’s reasonable to believe that at least three or more of the Duke LAX players may have been involved in what happened. Like you I object to those who wildly speculate about what did happen and who did what. And I include in that set not only those who dismiss this as another Tawana Brawley case, but also those who are ready to declare the entire Duke team guilty of rape and/or being an accessory to a crime.
It’s one thing to conclude a rape occured, and quite another to implicate the entire Duke LAX team as the assailants.
It’s called a code of silence. You get a group of men together, have them become emotionally and physically dependent on each other and build a bond based on shared priorities and belief systems and whether it’s law enforcement officers or athletes, they’re going to cover up each other’s misdeeds.
If there were a large group of them at the party and three of them raped a woman and the others remained silent about it when it’s probable they would have had some knowlege of it, shame on them for not coming forward. Shame on anyone else on the team who has heard about it(and at least some of them probably have, although not as a rape).
Also, it’s hardly unprecedented for university populations including fraternities, sororities and athletic teams not to buy or rent property in poorer surrounding neighborhoods and crap all over the people living there. They truly believe it’s within their rights to do so, the whole ridiculous “rite” of college kind of thing.
TangoMan, the reason why the lacrosse players are under suspicion is because they were, apparently, in the same location as the victim when she was attacked, not because they are lacrosse players and not because they are white.
OK, so what you’re saying is that it is fine to place 48 black men under suspicion because they all happened to be at a party where one black man committed a crime. It’s not that they’re black that places them under suspicion just that they are members of a recognizable group and they were all in proximity to a crime. In the case of the lacrosse team, that would explain why the one black member is not under suspicion, in that while he was at the party (meeting the proximity criterion) he didn’t fit the other characteristic of the alleged rapists (they were white.)
I’ll keep your rationale in mind next time I witness someone making blanket accusations against a recognizable minority, and so long as there is another condition pertinent to the charge, such as proximity to a crime, then I’ll council all the bleeding hearts to lay-off the accuser. This should be very helpful when I read about racial profiling and “driving while black”, especially when the black drivers are in the neighborhood of a crime, thus meeting both of your necessary conditions for a proper accusation.
I hold what appears to be inappropriate team solidarity against the 48 team members. I haven’t said that all 48 are rapists, and neither has anyone else here.
And there’s a big difference between being in a three-bedroom house while a crime took place, and driving through the general vincinity. If this were a murder, and the police decided to question everyone who was in the house when the murder occured, no one would question it.
Finally, like most of your posts concerning race, you in effect shove your head into a hole in the ground and pretend racism against non-whites never, ever happens. It’s true that I’d be a lot more worried about police acting badly if the police were going after blacks. That’s based not on reverse racism, but on a long history of racism by police against blacks, plus a good deal of empirical evidence showing that blacks are not treated fairly by the criminal justice system.
Indeed, TangoMan, please go out and find a case in which any significant number of people have raised a stink over the group of black people at a party where a rape or murder was committed being questioned by the police, or where anyone has raised a stink over a DA castigating black potential witnesses to a crime for refusing to provide testimony. Cases in which the potential witnesses were all arrested, or were questioned for more than 24 hours continuously without council don’t count.
Oh wait, since you are the one here raising that stink, perhaps you could link to some case where you have been the one raising that stink about the police questioning a large group of black people or of a DA castigating black people for refusing to provide evidence. Or does it only bother you when rich, white men get treated like that?
She’s a defense lawyer; not being sympathetic to accused rapists is bad for business.
And, TangoMan, before I refrain from judging this entire team for not coming forward to tell what they know, just like a stereotypical gang of black youths with ‘Stop Snitchin’ t-shirts, let me tell you a story:
I had a chance to talk with a policeman, who told me why a local bar and grill closed down: The bartenders, friends of the local frat boys, routinely spiked the drinks of their dates, so sex could be made easier. Funny how I never saw that story in any local newspaper, and how probably it only rated a paragraph in the campus paper.
Tell me again, why the presumption of a silent community around a crime should be one of innocence?
OK, so what you’re saying is that it is fine to place 48 black men under suspicion because they all happened to be at a party where one black man committed a crime. It’s not that they’re black that places them under suspicion just that they are members of a recognizable group and they were all in proximity to a crime. In the case of the lacrosse team, that would explain why the one black member is not under suspicion, in that while he was at the party (meeting the proximity criterion) he didn’t fit the other characteristic of the alleged rapists (they were white.)
So what do you think the police should have done when everyone at the party refused to talk to the detectives?
The police got a warrant (signed by a judge) to collect DNA from the students. Do you have a problem with that? Do you think the team should have voluntarily come forward to talk to the detectives?
When an assault and burglary happens at a party, and no one at the party will talk to the detectives, what in the world do you expect to happen?
Of course everyone will be under suspicion that was in the house at the time of the assault and burglary. That’s how our criminal justice system routinely works.
The police got a warrant (signed by a judge) to collect DNA from the students. Do you have a problem with that?
Actually, apart from the alleged rape, this is the issue that bothers me the most. If there are 3 rapists then there are 45 people who will have their DNA in law enforcement databanks and who had to submit to this procedure, as innocent people, against their will. My understanding is that the data, like fingerprints, stays in databanks and is not destroyed. This reminds me of the cases in the UK where the police go door to door to collect samples of DNA as a means of finding a suspect.
If this were a murder, and the police decided to question everyone who was in the house when the murder occured, no one would question it.
Nice shifting of the goal posts. I don’t think that anyone is complaining about the police questioning the entire lacrosse team, what they’re complaining about is the presumption that every member of the team is guilty of the crime before the police narrow their scope to individual suspects.
So you really are incapable of seeing the difference between going door to door taking DNA and taking DNA from a specific group of 47 people who fit the description of a suspect and who REFUSE to provide testimony of what happened.
I seriously doubt that the police would have resorted to DNA testing of everyone if the entire group hadn’t closed ranks around the actual suspects. If they had been willing to testify to what they saw and heard it is very likely that the police could have narrowed it down to a few people. Do you think that the case should simply be dropped because the team closed ranks?
I’d also still love to see a link to somewhere where you’ve shown you give the least little shit about suspects who aren’t rich and white. Surely, if you’re this concerned about civil liberties in the US you’ve once or twice found occasion to talk about the civil rights violations routinely inflicted on non-whites in this country?
TangoMan, the police are trying to figure out which of the 46 men present were among the three who committed the rape. To say that taking evidence from all 46 is wrong because there are no more than three guilty people makes it sound like you think that it’s only appropriate to conduct an investigation of those who are actually proven to be the perpetrators. Of course, if you can’t get evidence from all of them you have almost no way to prove who that would be. Policework hasn’t been quite that hobbled by notions of civil rights.
Tangoman: if the men in question were not supporting each other through complicity (silence), then the number of DNA samples would have been 3, not 46. These men chose to maintain their fraternal loyalty to each other in the face of possible criminal implication in the rape. The irony being, they’re entering the grey area of criminality themselves in so doing.
At the risk of beating the same dead horse in these threads, not all of this is hypothetical to all the posters here. I live near these men, in the past have lived directly across from these men. They have formed and nutured their own reputations in the community, very few of which involve adjectives such as “fine” or “upstanding”. These are young men, who are not tax paying community members, who come into neighborhoods, host underage parties, violate noise ordinances on at least weekly if not bi-weekly bases, refuse to bow to neighborhood requests for reform, and basically imply to their neighbors that if they don’t like the team member’s behavior, it is the responsibility of the neighbors to move. These are privileged males of the worst calibre and they finally got caught doing what they most likely have done for years. I’ve posted elsewhere about undergraduate females students toilet papering the houses of lacrosse team players — all as a warning sign to other females that a sexual assault had occured with the involvement of lacrosse team members.
These men have not been innocent, have vainly flaunted their guilt and criminal behavior in the past. Why now, when a woman has come forward to press rape charges, should we, as community members, suddenly assume an innocence these boys themselves have not proclaimed?
Anybody else thinking about the Jodie Foster movie, The Accused?
My understanding is that the data, like fingerprints, stays in databanks and is not destroyed.
Where do you get this understanding?
I’d also still love to see a link to somewhere where you’ve shown you give the least little shit about suspects who aren’t rich and white.
Here you go – I’m totally opposed to this effort directed at Black men at UVa:
Where do you get this understanding?
My understanding of this issue isn’t completely up to date but some of these links illustrate my concern. Initiatives in Virginia:
Then there was the Brandon Mayfield case summarized here:
Then there is the issue of competent execution of records expungement procedures. Expungement of records is synonymous with the sealing of records and not the destruction of records. Poor execution of these statutes leads to tragedies like this one:
Basically, we’re people are being asked to trust the competency of gov’t. Then there is the issue of multiple agencies having access to the records and expungement requests missing some agencies’ databases and the records repropogating after the expungement request is made.
I’m not sure what happened after the American Society of Law, Medicine & Ethics report, which I was following in 2004, because there was some controversy at the time about being able to predict a person’s race from a DNA sample.
Now that I think about it perhaps it was the developments in the UK that left me with this impression. I wonder how much this decision in the UK, will influence thinking in the US:
If you can give me a definitive assessment of the situation I’d be much obliged.
No, that wasn’t what Charles asked.
Where is the blog post or comment, dated before Charles’ question, in which you personally expressed outrage over the violation of a black person’s civil rights?
TangoMan is correct about Virginia.
It is fair to say that a number of men have been exonerated through the use of DNA evidence. That is not the end of the story, however. First, is the science sufficiently advanced to merit the kind of reliance that public officials (including public defenders) want to place on it? And are there adequate protections to prevent rogue or just misguided public servants from misleading juries and prosecutors about whether or not specific DNA matches crime scene evidence? In my mind, there are or have been serious questions on both fronts that would clearly justify someone in refusing to let their DNA become part of a database.
Also important, I think, is whether the mere presence of DNA in a database will permit others (employers, schools) to draw negative inferences about you. If so, then yes, obtaining it in a broad variety of circumstances and hanging on to it is very objectionable.
For all of these possible reasons, it is obnoxious to “encourage” every black man in Charlottesville to donate DNA for testing in order to catch a serial rapist irrespective of whether there is any evidence that the specific man has any connection to the case. I just don’t see how that scenario is similar to testing the DNA of every man who was admittedly present at a crime scene and who fits the description of the perpetrator.
TangoMan, the Charlottesville police are totally incompetent when it comes to sexual assault, or they used to be. I won’t get into the details, but as the victim of an assault in Charlottesville (and the friend of others), there were times when I thought that the police’s main objective was trying to convince women that the crimes against their person really weren’t a big enough deal for the police to investigate — they always seemed to be so eager to talk women out of pressing charges or filing a complaint. They were at least as concerned about crime stats as actually solving crimes. That was a lifetime ago, but it was frustrating.
Sadly, No. has a link to (and critique of) a jaw-droppingly horrific editorial about this case; it truly boggles the mind.
Well, fuck them all.
Innocence my ass.
This from the campus newspaper The Chronicle (www.dukechronicle.com)
I’m seeing so much red right now I could freakin’ scream this place down.
Fuck these boys.
Every time I think I’ve read enough and studied enough about these issues so I think I understand how much some men really, truly, hate women, I’m surprised all over again.
You shouldn’t be. Qgrrl is right. It’s not a new thing. >:
and his attorney says this email somehow proves his innocence. I’m so disgusted right now I feel like throwing up. This situation gets worse and worse.
“more evidence of a lack of a guilty mind.”
how the fuck does talking about murdering someone look like “lack of a guilty mind”!?!!?!?
sounds to me like McFadyen is pissed off that he missed out on “getting some action”. If you take my meaning. The little pig.
Where is the blog post or comment, dated before Charles’ question, in which you personally expressed outrage over the violation of a black person’s civil rights?
Right here, dated February 25, 2005, where I argue that current affirmative action policies are favoring voluntary immigrants at the expense of native born Black students. This is an intentional harm being done to native born Black students in the service of a diversity PR strategy and the whole point of AA was to lessen the educational barriers to socio-economic success for Black citizens. I side with the interests of Black students.
I’ve had most of the shock knocked out of me by now. As awful and offensive as I think what the guy wrote was, most of me was thinking at least he was stupid enough to get caught at it and it’s out there for the world to see.
Now, maybe the University will get smart and take action against the lacrosse team, but most likely, not. And if they ever do, they’ll do what they do in similar situations like this one, they will pick out the “worst” offenders and say it’s a “bad apple” problem, not a deeper cultural problem within both the team and the University, in terms of the history of its relationship with the community around it.
I wonder what Ryan’s mommy has to say about her poor baby now! He was just joking, you people can’t take a joke. What a sick little boy! Of course he would never do anythng so bad, perhaps the police or the accuser planted the e-mail too. Someone will come up with that one after while, since so many people think thiis is a grad conspriracy.
anon from Rachel’s Tavern mentioned that someone had been looking for another incident of gangrape by an athletic team, but couldn’t find one. They must not have been looking very hard. One that I know of — made the press all over the country at the time — is detailed in the “Controversies” section at the University of Colorado at Boulder Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Colorado_at_Boulder .
In 2004, the University of Colorado was sued in federal district court for its alleged role in fostering the environment in which the plaintiff was gang-raped by by CU football players and recruits. The substance of the allegation was that the CU Athletic Department had knowingly facilitated alcohol use and sex with female CU students to sell its program to recruits while overlooking a pattern of bad behavior, including at least two rapes, by players and recruits. The event soon became a political and media event with sensational headlines. The governor and district attorneys all made public statements about the case.
Highlights of the complaint filed by the plaintiff and intended to establish CU’s complicity with the rapes were as follows:
* In the fall of 1995, prostitutes were sent to the hotel room of recruits brought to Colorado by the CU football program.
* In 1997, a seventeen-year-old local high school student was brought to a party for recruits, became intoxicated, and was sexually assaulted more than once by at least one football player and/or recruit. She reported this to the Boulder Police Department. One player was minimally disciplined for providing alcohol to minors.
… etc.
There is a longstanding tradition of “player privilege” in which both college and pro athletics teams are protected from the consequences of misbehaviour, including criminal assaults. Often people refuse to believe that something truly bad really did happen on the grounds that “why did they have to rape? They could get any girl they wanted!” — without understanding that rapists are not sexually-deprived losers who can’t get laid (a myth not borne out by data), or understanding that any group which does not have boundaries firmly set will continue to push those boundaries to the point of abuse. That is human nature, sadly.
Unfortunately the track record of convictions is clear, too; if a conviction is actually obtained in this case it will truly be remarkable.
Just pointing out that the so-called “sex positive” feminist wing is amazingly silent on this issue. Certainly, those folks who are claiming that any woman who is an “exotic dancer” has relinquished the right to say no to sex (or battery, strangulation or robbery as well) need to have a chat with those folks claiming that working in the “sex industry” is just peachy keen, and that women really “have all the power” in those situations, and that the guys are really great, and everything’s wholesome and “empowering.” I’ve never once heard a pro-porn, pro-prostitution “feminist” talk about what’s going on between Russian and Turkey, or about how any woman in the “sex industry” has relinquished her right to fight back against sexual attack without having her character maligned, or even, in cases like this one, when being in those jobs has a lot more to do with racial and gender discrimination, and how the GOPs killed off financial aid.
Yeah, stripping’s great. What a turn on.
In an earlier thread on this I asked, “what evidence is there that a rape even occurred?” Well, I have an answer now, and I have to say that it would appear that some kind of assault seems to have been perpetrated on this woman.
I’ve worked with young men of middle school and high school age for about 14 years now. 99% of them are decent kids that I don’t think would ever be capable of attacking anyone. But you do run into kids that have some very strange ideas about what they are entitled to. And, yeah, it’s usually kids whose parents have money (although I carefully don’t say that kids with money usually have inflated ideas of entitlement). I once had a kid say to me, “My dad says that if someone does something bad to me, I should do something worse to them to keep them from doing it again.” And I’m supposed to trust this kid with an axe or a knife? We did have to disarm his older brother once….
I believe in “innocent until proven guilty” both inside and outside the courtroom. But the distinction made in a previous post is quite valid; we can legitimately assume that this woman was assaulted even though we don’t know who did it.
I see no need to rush to judgement regarding who is guilty. But it seems that someone committed a crime against this woman, and that other people became aware of that crime at some point and are holding out from providing information about it. Radfem is almost right when she says “It’s called a code of silence. You get a group of men together, have them become emotionally and physically dependent on each other and build a bond based on shared priorities and belief systems and whether it’s law enforcement officers or athletes, they’re going to cover up each other’s misdeeds.” I say almost because I haven’t observed that this kind of behavior is limited to males. But regardless, these people are wrong. Loyalty is admirable, but loyalty to the civic body overrides loyalty to the group in this case. By holding out they are committing a sinful, immoral act, and they should go to the cops and tell them what they know. I imagine that at least some of those people are holding out because they fear that they themselves may be subject to either criminal or civil penalties. But when you do something wrong, the right thing to do is to stand up and face the consequences, and make restitution as best as you are able.
I wouldn’t blame anyone there, even if they are completely innocent, from getting a lawyer; any civil suit resulting from this will probably try to sweep in everyone possible, even if they really didn’t have any idea what the hell was going on. I don’t blame the ones who are complicit from hiring a lawyer and trying to get the best deal they can; that’s only human. But at the end of the day, they should come clean and help the cops find out what happened. This isn’t a speeding ticket, it’s some kind of assault.
If I was the parent of one of these kids, I’d be having nightmares right now. My own son is a great kid, but if he was at that party I pray to God that he wouldn’t get involved, or that he would get involved to try to stop it if he knew what was going on.
anon from Rachel’s Tavern mentioned that someone had been looking for another incident of gangrape by an athletic team, but couldn’t find one.
Yeah, there is also the St. Johns LaCrosse team, “Our Boys” is an entire book about another example. It isn’t too hard to come by. Oh, there were the 1992 NY Mets in Spring Training – although I believe that those charges were dropped.
I suggest typing: athletic team rape
into google. Just keep going until you get past all the links to the current Duke LaCrosse team & there are plenty to be found.
That’s because you don’t have to live with lifelong reminders that you are the rapeable one, no matter who you are, what you do, or how truthfully you live your own life. Innocent until proven guilty isn’t so much about justice in this instance: it’s a means of putting blinders on women’s judgements and self-protective instincts.
Personally I think they where guilty no doubt about it.They are high class (white) boys who can afford almost anything they want and i guess they thought since they got away with most things and where decieving others as “star players” and “good boys”, anything they did wouldn’t matter.It would be the (black) exotic dancers word against thier fancy act word.Anyway the community they live in is mostly white who supports them and usually by most people exotic dancers is just another word for prostitute whores but with different actions.Its really really possible in my opinion that the Duke Lax players who where involoved will get off easy and if they do that will tell alot about how thier community is.
If someone excels in athletics and academics and works hard to go to a place like Duke, does that make them an “elitist”? People keep referencing the fact that these lacrosse players are white. Is that not racism?
neocon76: The fact that the boys involved are white is almost certainly going to influence the outcome of the case — THAT is racism. Pointing out that fact is not.
There are more blacks in jail in proportion to the rest of the population than there are whites. Pointing this out is a statement of fact, not racism. Making the statement that there are more blacks in jail because blacks commit more crimes IS racism, because it ignores complicating factors:
Police are more likely to prosecute an “active investigation” against a black than against a white — not a systematic or universal bias, but a noticeable one.
Blacks are far more likely to be convicted of a crime than whites — even where evidence is nearly identical in quantity and quality. This is most often because of (a) jury bias, and/or (b) the fact that more blacks than whites fall below the poverty line and must make use of publicly appointed counsel. In other words, white suspects can more often afford better lawyers.
Blacks are more likely than whites to be given a custodial sentence, as opposed to a fine or public service, even when convicted of an identical crime.
(These things are culled from various publications at http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pubalp2.htm, although it would take some work to give you the exact publication and page number. )
Referencing the fact that the victim is black and that the accused is white would only be racist if justice were truly equal and the law was blind to race in practice as well as ideal. As it stands, however, it is a polarizing factor which has a real effect on how people are reacting to both the accused and the victim, and so pointing this out functions to make it obvious and not allow people to ignore that fact.
If you have problems understanding what is racism and what isn’t, perhaps we can find more examples to make it clear.
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luna_the_cat,
“Making the statement that there are more blacks in jail because blacks commit more crimes IS racism, …”
But why they DO commit more crimes ( that is, more likely to commit crimes. specifically violent ones, like murder, rape etc.) Or you dispute that?
Just pointing out that the so-called “sex positive” feminist wing is amazingly silent on this issue.
It’s much easier to pretend people are silent when you refuse to hear them. Or when you can simply construct a caricature in your head, stuff words in its mouth, and go home happy.
Igor, even though I suspect you’re going to get banned, let me ask you this: Have you crawled out from under your rock at any point at all in the last few decades? I’m not going to explain the history of racism in this country to you, but I suggest you go look it up. If you’re old enough to use a computer, you’re old enough to read about the legacy of racism in this country.
Igor — Yes, I dispute that blacks actually commit more crimes than whites.
Perhaps they do; I’m not saying it is impossible, since proportionately more blacks than whites live under the poverty line, and there are well-established links between socioeconomic status, poverty & police response times, unaddressed interpersonal violence, access to education and overall levels of crime — but you will need a great deal more than just “how many blacks are in jail” as evidence of actual crime levels, because blacks end up in jail more often than whites regardless of whether they have committed identical crimes or committed any crime at all.
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#72
has the stripper said they wore condoms, or are you just clutching at straws?
Ginmar, why engage in personal attacks?
Luna_the_cat –
Well, I was not asking how many blacks are in jail. That sort of statistics is very tricky to analize, there are too many factors that affect who is more likely to go to jail (availability of witnesses, jury pool selection, quality of available lawers, intimidation by other criminals, attitude towards (perceprion of) the court system etc.) I was talking about the raw FBI crime data.
It’s not a personal attack, it’s an accurate assessment. You are aware that there is this thing called racism, correct? And that most polic e departments are made up of white guys? And that they decide who gets arrested? Need I go on?
Igor, here are a couple of website to read regarding white versus black criminals. I hope this helps to enlighten you.
http://www.zmag.org/ZMag/articles/wise.htm
http://www.lipmagazine.org/articles/featwise_34.htm
Sorry. The it’s-all-racist-white-cops theory doesn’t hold up to explain differential levels of crime between racial groupings. It’s a plausible theory, at least in many locales, and there is certainly plenty of evidence that police forces are treating black suspects poorly.
That said, the theory fails when tested. Blacks as a group commit more violent crimes than whites as a group. There are a number of reasons for that, and some of them do in fact involve racism against blacks as a contributing factor. But it’s a contributing factor to the behavior, not just to the measurements; we’re not arresting black murderers in huge numbers because the cops like to bust on black guys, we’re arresting black murderers because there are a lot of murders being committed by blacks.
The articles submitted by Sally are examples of rhetoric without analysis. “Whites are four times more likely to be victimized by another white person than by a person of color” – wow, that’s really impressive, until you consider the fact that there are six white Americans for every black American. Faulty logic and incoherent premises litter both editorials.
Since crime is an individual behavior, however, such group analysis is an inappropriate locus of study, unless one surmises that group characteristics such as cultural choices are a factor and is studying that impact. “White people” and “black people” don’t kill; individual humans kill. Joe killed Alice because he made a bad moral choice, not because of the skin color grouping he can be associated with.
It’s not about color. Rape is not about sex. Rape is a crime of power. Unfortunately, people equate rape with sex – and until they understand the difference, no progress will ever be made to tighten the laws that deal with this crime on all college campuses. Please review: http://www.uvavictimsofrape.com and see how the prestigious UVA turns a blind eye to this crime. Duke is not unique; it’s just gotten media attention.
I’m a little curious about that first 911 call. I don’t have speakers on this PC, so I can’t listen to it. So for those of you who may have, can you tell me what it was all about? Was it solely to report that someone was shouting racial slurs? That’s a very bad thing for people to be doing. It’s uncivilized and insulting, and makes the people doing it sound like fools. However, I was not aware that shouting racial slurs in public represents an emergency demanding immediate response by the cops or the fire department. Can someone tell me if there was some other reason for that 911 call?
As far as innocent until proven guilty goes, you’re right, Amp; it’s a courtroom standard. You can think someone’s guilty, but still think that they should be found “not guilty” in a court of law, as you and I have discussed before. But in this case, there’s still enough holes in the various evidence that is (and is not!) before the public to make me think that right now, any opinion anyone may have isn’t fully informed enough to be particularly valid. Was this woman beaten up? Seems pretty likely. Was she beaten up by people at that party? Maybe not. Was she raped? That’s definitely unknown. What comes out at trial will likely change that, but right now it’s tough to make a judgement.
However, I was not aware that shouting racial slurs in public represents an emergency demanding immediate response by the cops or the fire department.
Spoken like someone who has never had racial slurs shouted at them. For your edification, shouted racial slurs directed at you are (1) a threat and (2) often precede violence. I say with 100% certainty that if racial slurs were being shouted at me by 10 to 50 young white men late at night that I would view that as an emergency.
Now reflect on how fortunate you have been to have been born with the privilege of not having ever had racial slurs hurled at you and try to imagine what it would be like if that weren’t the case.
I called 911 when the Duke Lacrosse team threatened to beat me up b/c I was a dyke… I’d do it if they were shouting racial slurs at someone. These men were drunk, they are big, aggressive looking men. If I were passing them by and they shouted slurs at me for no reason, I’d sure as hell dial 911. Making threats is illegal. A racial slur is a threat.
FWIW, the Durham Police had a grand sense of humor the night I called them regarding my complaint — they sent two dyke cops out to talk to the players who were hosting the party.
:)
Jake Squid:
Unfortunately the link to the transcript is now dead, but working from memory it seems that the woman in at least one of the calls did not regard the incident as requiring an immediate police response. Rather she repeatedly emphasised that the police should handle it as they saw fit.
I haven’t had the benefit of hearing her tone of voice, but the impression I got was of someone who was very distressed, but for whom the simple act of speaking to the dispatcher was reassurance. I agree with you that a large number of people hurling racist abuse at anyone is a threat, and is rightly to be regarded as an emergency. But I think in this case, the woman realised as she was making the call that she was no longer in danger, that the threat had passed.
I can’t speak for RonF, but I’m white, and agree that I am fortunate to be at not much risk of racist abuse because of my colour. “Not much risk” is not no risk. One of my white friends was assaulted by a group of Asian youths in a racially motivated incident. He was lucky in that he was only jostled and verbally abused, but escaped without injury.
Street violence is of course, gender-selective just as it can be race selective. Although women may fear to go out more than men, it is men who are more likely to be attacked. I have twice been assaulted – physically beaten – by strangers while walking in the street in unprovoked attacks. I have also been threatened with violence on several occasions. Most of my male friends have had similar experiences. Few if any of my female friends have.
I don’t agree with you that not being subject to racial abuse makes me privileged. I don’t measure a person’s privilege with reference to the ill-treatment of others, but against the appropriate treatment of all. No person should be subject to racist abuse; that is a right, not a privilege. That you don’t enjoy that right is a disprivilege for you, not a privilege for me. On the other hand, my western standard of living (yours too, probably) is privileged because the resources required to sustain it could not be provided to every person.
By the same token, I do not consider the relative freedom women have to walk the streets with less danger of being attacked than men to be a privilege. Everybody should be able to do so with no danger at all. That there is danger for everyone is a disprivilege for everyone.
By feminist logic, of course, women’s relative freedom from violence in the street should be considered a privilege, but feminists never apply their logic when it would lead to such a conclusion. Their justification for not so doing? It’s because men are privileged! A wholly circular argument.
Wow, Daran. If that isn’t doublespeak, I don’t know what is. If one person (or group) is “disprivileged” wrt another group then, by default, that other group is privileged wrt to the first person (or group).
And, you know, we’ve been over the “men are at more risk for X, therefore women as a class are privileged over men” enough for you to know that it will not be viewed as valid – because it isn’t. It’s just another PHMT complaint. And I can’t think of a less appropriate thread to voice that tripe in than this one.
Um, yeah, I have to say the ‘disprivileged’ thing makes no sense. You’re also forgetting, Daran, that you don’t get a level of ‘how everyone ought to be treated’; your privilege puts you above that level.
“By the same token, I do not consider the relative freedom women have to walk the streets with less danger of being attacked than men to be a privilege. ”
You might want to learn a little about statistics. You have obviously not considered that women probably “walk the streets” a lot less than men do, so * if* there are fewer attacks, it doesn’t necessarily mean less danger.
I doubt the contention that women can walk the streets with less danger. Less danger from getting into a fight and being beaten, sure. But that isn’t the only type of assault or attack that occurs. Hello, rape? And as Sheena notes, I am sure that women spend less time walking the streets.
There’s also the fact that varieties of assault have variable impact. I’ve never been so much as accosted on the street, but as a security-minded person I do take the risk into consideration. I don’t think anything of going for a stroll, even in bad neighborhoods at “dangerous” times of day – but I’m also not worried about a soul-destroying assault. If somebody mugs me or beats me up, it’s not going to be a (de)formative experience in my life. Hell, there are times when I’d welcome the fisticuffs.
I imagine that the life impact of a street rape or sexual assault on a woman is considerably more distressing, and of considerably more negative impact on quality of life. It’s not just a simple tally of how many attacks on men, how many on women, with attacks treated as fungible. They aren’t.